The team now known as the Boston Red Sox played its first season in 1901. The city of Boston had a well-established National League team, known at the time as the Beaneaters, but the founders of the American League knew that Boston was a strong baseball market and when they launched the league as a new major league in 1901, they went head-to-head with the N.L. in Chicago, Philadelphia, and Boston. Chicago won the American League pennant and Boston finished second, just four games behind. The Boston Americans played in a new ballpark - the Huntington Avenue Grounds - literally on the other side of the railroad tracks from the Beaneaters and they out-drew the Beaneaters by more than 2-1, in part because they had enticed some of the more popular players - player/ manager Jimmy Collins, pitcher Cy Young, and slugger Buck Freeman. This volume represents the collective work of more than 25 members of SABR --the Society for American Baseball Research. It offers individual biographies of the players, team owner Charles Somers, league founder Ban Johnson, and two of the team's most noted fans: Hi Hi Dixwell and Nuf Ced McGreevy. There is also a "biography" of the Huntington Avenue Grounds ballpark and a study of media coverage of Boston baseball in 1901, and a timeline running from the first spring training through that year's postseason games. The book includes over 125 vintage and rare photographs. Includes written contributions by the following SABR members: Bill Nowlin., Fred Schuld, Joe Santry and Cindy Thomson, Ron Selter, Donna L. Halper., Charlie Bevis, Steve Krah., Charles Faber, Dennis Auger, Jim Elfers, Eric Enders, Jack Morris, Paul Wendt, Frank Vaccaro, Rory Costello, Mike Lackey, Dan Desrochers, David Forrester, Tom Simon, David Southwick, Joanne Hulbert, Pete Nash, Dan Fields. Full Table of Contents: Introduction: Bill Nowlin Franchise Firsts: Bill Nowlin Team Owner: George Somers: Fred Schuld American League President Ban Johnson: Joe Santry and Cindy Thomson The Ballpark: Huntington Avenue Grounds: Ron Selter A Fuller Portrait of the First Home Game of the Franchise Baseball in the New Century: Following the Boston Americans in 1901: Donna L. Halper The Players Ben Beville: Bill Nowlin Jimmy Collins: Charlie Bevis Lou Criger: Steve Krah George "Nig" Cuppy: Charles Faber Tommy Dowd: Bill Nowlin Hobe Ferris: Dennis Auger Frank Foreman: Jim Elfers Buck Freeman: Eric Enders Harry Gleason: Jack Morris Charlie Hemphill: Paul Wendt Charlie Jones: Frank Vaccaro Win Kellum: Bill Nowlin Ted Lewis: Rory Costello Larry McLean: Mike Lackey Fred Mitchell: Bill Nowlin Frank Morrissey: Bill Nowlin Freddy Parent: Dan Desrochers George Prentiss: David Forrester Osee Schrecongost: Bill Nowlin Jack Slattery: Bill Nowlin Chick Stahl: Dennis Auger Jake Volz: Bill Nowlin George Winter: Tom Simon Cy Young: David Southwick Personality: "Hi Hi" Dixwell: Joanne Hulbert Personality: Mike "Nuf Ced" McGreevy: Pete Nash 1901 Boston Americans Season Timeline: Bill Nowlin By the Numbers: Dan Fields

OPENING FENWAY PARK WITH STYLE: The 1912 World Champion Red Sox is the collaborative work of 27 members of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR). This book, which contains over 300 period photographs and illustrations, has at its core the individual biographies of every player on the team, even Douglass Smith-who appeared in just one game. There are also biographies of owner John I. Taylor and American League founder Ban Johnson. The book also contains a detailed timeline of the full calendar year, with essays on the construction of brand-new Fenway Park and its first renovation, as the team (which won the pennant by 14 games) prepared for Fenway's first World Series. The 1912 World Series remains one of the most exciting in baseball history, extending to eight games because of a 14-inning tie game in Game Two. In Game Eight the Giants scored a tie-breaking run to take a lead in the top of the 10th inning, only to see Boston come back with two in the bottom of the 10th to win at home. Other articles in the book detail intriguing topics including a fascinating spring training, during which Sox players joined the hunt for a murderer in Hot Springs, life in Boston in 1912, and how the newspapers and telegraph reported the games in the days before radio, television, or the internet. It may surprise some to learn of the thousands of people who crowded outside the downtown offices of newspapers so they could get batter-by-batter updates on the progress of the World Series games-in-progress. There are more than a dozen books celebrating the 100th anniversary of Fenway Park, but only this one is devoted to the 1912 season itself, providing the context for the then-new park which remains home to Boston baseball a century later.

Of all the teams in the annals of baseball, only a select few can lay claim to historic significance. One of those teams is the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers, the first racially integrated Major League team of the twentieth century. The addition of Jackie Robinson to its roster changed not only baseball but also the nation. Yet Robinson was just one member of that memorable club, which included Carl Furillo, Gil Hodges, Pee Wee Reese, Pete Reiser, Duke Snider, Eddie Stanky, Arky Vaughan, and Dixie Walker. Also present was a quartet of baseball's most unforgettable characters: co-owners Branch Rickey and Walter O'Malley, suspended manager Leo Durocher, and radio announcer Red Barber. This book is the first to offer biographies of everyone on that incomparable team as well as accounts of the moments and events that marked the Dodgers' 1947 season: Commissioner Happy Chandler suspending Durocher, Rickey luring his old friend Burt Shotton out of retirement to replace Durocher, and brilliant outfielder Reiser being sidelined after running into a fence. In spite of all this, the Dodgers went on to win the National League pennant over the heavily favored St. Louis Cardinals. And of course, there is the biggest story of the season, where history and biography coalesce: Jackie Robinson, who overcame widespread hostility to become Rookie of the Year-and to help the Dodgers set single-game attendance records in cities around the National League.